


Message!

by sabs_cat



Category: Deadpool - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-22
Updated: 2016-10-22
Packaged: 2018-08-23 23:40:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8347327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sabs_cat/pseuds/sabs_cat
Summary: Smoke without fire. Strange men. The dead walking. In the city that never sleeps there lies an ancient evil. But the Avengers can stop it? Right?





	

**Author's Note:**

> Thi is an AU, taking place after the first film, and breaking off from canon there. Enjoy :D

New York is the city that never sleeps. Something is always happening, a birth, a death, an alien invasion. Someone is always awake. The lights from the windows burn throughout the night, and dominate the landscape, a vigilant reminder that you are not alone. Even as time marches on and the lights’ brilliant reflection on the Hudson changed to a watery yellow blob in the early October morning, it was still there. Only now, from the depths of the river, a body, slowly, inelegantly, floated up to the surface, and broke the water with a soft flaph. It lay face down, bobbing gently in the current, ripples dancing away from the movements it made. The body started to make its way downstream with the pull of the tide. A prudent observer, who wasn’t worrying about why there was a body in the first place would wonder how it got there, or why is wasn’t tangled in the weeds below, why did it float to the surface so quickly? Alas, there was no prudent observer, which was probably for the better. There was however Harry.  
  
Harry probably wasn’t his name, but it was what everyone called him for as long as he could remember, and that stretched back a considerable amount of time. Harry was a tramp, and I suppose you could say he was a successful tramp. He knew the best shelters, the best begging area, the households who could be persuaded to cough up some food, and naturally, the best body dumping ground, where he could go through the possessions of all and sundry. It wasn’t like they needed it, he reasoned, being dead and all. Harry had had a couple of favourite spots throughout his career, but this was certainly the best. Tucked away from the general public with the remains of a rotting pier, it was possible to set up a sort of net, and catch what floated through. Some days that meant plastic bags or cans. Other days it meant bodies. Either way, it suited Harry.  
Today he trundled down with his old shopping cart, one of the many marooned ship-like in the area, wheels squeaking, metal body rattling against the assortment of cans and plastic sacks stored inside. Harry stopped the cart under the remains of a tree, then pulled a long stick from it. It had been a snooker pole originally, but was now modified with a long hook from a clothes hanger tied to the end. Harry walked down to the edge of the pier, and pulled the net up, not minding the sound of it. It was far away enough here that any noise here wouldn’t be suspicious and would only melt into the background hubbub of New York. The net only gave up some empty food packets, a plastic bottle, and an old coke can. Harry picked out the can, before throwing the rest away in disgust. So much for good pickings.   
This spot hasn’t done too good this month, he thought to himself as he knelt down to arrange the net again. Might move it again. It was true; findings here had been good after the alien attack, but had recently dried up. One of the other tramps said he’d seen men in suits hanging around the spot, but Harry had just laughed at him and called him an alkie.  
  
The old tramp stood up with creaking knees, having finished the task at hand, but as he did so something caught his eye. A body, floating in the river, tangled and held aloft in some branches. Harry nearly fell over in his effort to quickly get the pole and drag it over. After some heaving, it was dragged up, out of the water and onto the rotting edge of the pier. He could see now that it was a blond man, wearing a thick tattered coat stained dark brown by the water. Definitely dead.  
As Harry reached to put his hand in the dead man’s pocket, a fist collided with the side of his face, knocking him out. If he hadn’t been knocked out, he would’ve seen that his attacker was a wild looking naked woman, with staring blue eyes, glassy looking, but somehow focused. The woman dragged Harry’s inert body off the pier, tucking him besides the abandoned shopping cart, doing it with ease. Her nakedness would allow any observer to see her well-developed muscles.   
She walked up to the dead man. She poked him with her toe once. The body did nothing. She said,“Stop lazing about, we gotta job to do.” The dead body remained still, water pooling around it, and running off the pier in little drips. The woman grit her teeth in frustration, and placed her foot next to the dead man’s face. Immediately the body’s eyes snapped open, and with an indignant squawk tried to jerk away from it, but fell off the pier instead with a load splash.  
The woman snorted in amusement, squatting on the balls of her feet at the edge of the pier, mottled hair falling over her shoulder. Out of the water bobbed up the dead man, head first and upright this time. He glared at the woman, who just grinned at him.  
  
“Your feet stink.” he said, water draining out from between his teeth as he spoke. It seemed not to affect him.  
“I know.” She replied, grin growing larger, showing off the needle sharp teeth in her mouth. She stepped up and back, allowing the man room to pull himself out the water and try to shake it off. The grey morning light didn’t look like it would help in the slightest. The man sighed and pulled a pair of battered looking glasses out of his pocket and put them on. He started walking down the pier, up onto the bank, and into the surrounding area. It was an abandoned, vaguely industrial looking area, the shells of buildings slowly decaying under the quiet supervision of nature. The man turned back to look at his companion.  
“You coming, Sabell?” he called. The woman didn’t look up from where she was furiously re-arranging the possessions in the shopping cart.  
“Yeah, wait a sec…okay, done!” she yelled back, before bounding up the bank, graceful were the other man had been ungainly. As she walked towards him, her body appeared to contract, shrinking down on itself, changing, until at the man’s feet stood a large tabby cat. They started to walk off.  
  
“You didn’t have to do that.” He said as they left the area, passing smashed windows and greying wall, years of graffiti daubed on them. Bindweed grew over a stack of tyres. It was quiet, with the noise of the city reduced to a background rustle.  
“Course I did! He was gonna rob you!” Sabell replied, trotting along silently with the man’s strides.  
“He probably needed the money more that I would. Anyway, it’s not like he would’ve found any, is it?”  
“Nathaniel!” the cat moaned in mock desperation.  
“He wouldn’t’ve! ‘Sides, you’re just annoyed that we’ve been stuck with this. It’s just one little job, bother the Avengers, then we get holiday time! It’ll be easy.” Nathaniel replied, a smile pulling at his lips. They carried on walking as the sun rose and the watery sunlight became brighter. Manhattan lay in the distance.

**Author's Note:**

> Yay, prologue! Don't worry, we will see the Avengers in the first chapter. Also, I am in dire need of a beta or just someone I can soundboard off of. If you're interested just drop me a comment and I'll get back to you asap. Thanks for reading!


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